


Minds As Cold As Stars

by Zoe_Grimm



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Darkness, F/F, Hurts So Good, Romeo and Juliet References, So many turns, Star-crossed, Suffering, Suicide Attempt, Two of them
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-29
Updated: 2018-01-29
Packaged: 2019-03-09 06:58:20
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 909
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13476135
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zoe_Grimm/pseuds/Zoe_Grimm
Summary: Sky blue eyes looked up at the ceiling and saw nothing but darkness. Maleficent felt her heart flutter, that damaged, tired little thing, that yet kept on beating no matter how much she screamed for it to stop. She had seen too much, felt too much in this life that spanned centuries. She just wanted to rest. To sleep forever, if that was what it took to stop her from dreaming...





	Minds As Cold As Stars

**Author's Note:**

> I am aware of the similarities to Romeo and Juliet, I simply do not care. Let me know what you think!

Sky blue eyes looked up at the ceiling and saw nothing but darkness. Maleficent felt her heart flutter, that damaged, tired little thing, that yet kept on beating no matter how much she screamed for it to stop. She had seen too much, felt too much in this life that spanned centuries. She just wanted to rest. To sleep forever, if that was what it took to stop her from dreaming... about Regina, only to wake up every morning in a nightmare without her. 'She is gone. And she is never coming back to you. So why stay?' Why linger? Why drag out the pain like the last drops from a bottle of wine that slipped down her throat like so much blood, drowning all of her fire. She felt the flames dying inside, ever since Regina left. But it would not suffice. She needed more than not keeping herself alive, she needed to die. All it would take was the prick of a needle...

***

'Jump', Regina thought, that evil little voice whispering into her ear again. 'If you hate this life so much, why don't you end it?' If you are married to a king who will never love you, if you reign over a kingdom that barely knows you are even there, why are you still here?' Regina tightened her hold on the banister, looking out over everything that did not truly belong to her. Everything that had ever hurt her seemed to weigh her down, like a whole world resting heavily on her shoulders, and it wanted her to fall... to break all of her bones against the stones at her feet, to in the end be truly broken.

***

'I want to fly', two minds thought, a thousand miles apart. Regina recalled that one moment, the wildest of joys, when she had been truly and undoubtedly free, when nothing had held her back. That joy was still out there, somewhere, and she had left it behind. To be queen. To be nothing. To be an empty something sitting on a throne that nobody bowed to. 'If I had my own castle, now', she thought, 'I would fill it with your fire until we burned brighter than the coldest stars. Until we razed these kingdoms to reign over the ashes. And I would forever be by your side.' She did not want to be buried here. She wished her body to rot on black marble, cold fingers eternally intertwined with the one who had once gifted her warmth. And joy. And love.

***

Silent tears slid from the sky like droplets of rain over Maleficent's face, as she felt the poison settling inside of her veins, making itself at home beneath her bones. She had not given any thoughts to where she would die. Without Regina by her side, it hardly seemed to matter. And as she slipped from this world, she thought she could almost hear her calling...

***

The tears ran down Regina's face in a river of despair as she looked upon blinded, sky blue eyes that were fixed on something beyond this world. Maleficent's heart was still faintly beating where she lay on the stone cold floor, but her mind had already gone. Regina sank down beside her, slipping into something that felt like oblivion. Gently and with trembling fingers, she closed those forget-me-not eyes. She rested her crown-heavy head on Maleficent's chest and listened to her heartbeats growing slower, listened to her lover die. 

"If I had this castle", she whispered against Maleficent's body that was growing colder by the moment, "I would fill it with your fire until it burned brighter than the coldest stars." Her eyes stared unfixedly at the fireplace, commanding the flames to climb higher and consume them, to build them a burning monument that towered over everything else. It seemed sad somehow that she would not see it. The smoke would take her before the flames ever even claimed her skin. Yet she would lie, eternally, by Maleficent's side. She kissed her then, one last time, tasting the last traces of poison on Maleficent's lips... it tasted so familiar. Like a death in the darkness, that was only a death so long as you were dreaming... and Regina was already falling asleep as Maleficent opened her eyes.

***

She woke to the flames. To something heavy on her chest, something with a heartbeat and lungs that were breathing in too much smoke with every passing moment. She had not taken enough of the poison. It had merely been a curse instead of the irreversable fate she had intended, in a moment when she had still believed she would never see her queen. She did not want to be the one to watch her lover die. She breathed in, deeper, inhaling more than air with every rise of her chest, struggling to her feet. She could barely stand, but she could breathe. In with the flames, in with the fire, into something she was made of. She poured the smoke down her own throat until she thought she would choke on it, yet she kept drinking it in. Eventually she sank back down onto her knees, kneeling beside her queen, watching her chest rising and falling. Feeling for a heart that was beating steadily. "We will build our empire on this", she said softly, "and you will be queen". 

In the warmth of the castle, Regina once more opened her eyes.


End file.
